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19 June 2006

MY TAKE ON THE SLA CONFERENCE

I wish I could just upload all my notes from the conference, but it would be a very poor business decision. If you want to read my reports, you really ought to subscribe to The One-Person Librarynewsletter. But if you can’t/won’t/don’t subscribe, you can read the SLA Conference blog at http://slablogger.typepad.com/sla_2006_conference_blog/The convention center is an excellent facility. Yes, it is long, but there are lots of places to sit and talk, and two hotels are connected to it. It is also right next to the Inner Harbor, well placed for sightseeing, museuming, dinner out, and just looking at nature. The food was reasonably good, service was adequate.

We really need free wifi in convention center, especially if the Association recruits volunteer bloggers. It would also benefit everyone and cut down the number of terminals needed in the Internet area.

Why was there no recording of sessions?

Attendance was up 11 percent from last year, but eight CE sessions were canceled. Attendance: 5844. The breakdown: members, 2519 (43%); non-members, 1406 (24%); exhibitors, 1919 (33%). For the first time I can remember, the maximum number of concurrent sessions went down, from 30 in Nashville (the last conference I went to) to 26—and it was at a different time, Tuesday at 730 a.m., not on Tuesday afternoon.

The Solo Librarians Division was very disorganized this year.

I loved having the exhibits open on Sunday. That’s a great time to really connect with vendors; there is adequate time to talk to them.

The opening keynoter, Gwen Ifill, was a very typical SLA keynoter—interesting, entertaining, and totally devoid of content (things that we can take home and use in our work). However, I am adding closing keynoter Walt Mossberg to my very short list of keynote speakers who provided content, along with being entertaining and interesting. The others are Rosabeth Moss Kantor—years ago in Boston—and Larry Prusak of IBM. There may have been others, but I haven’t been to every conference.

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ABOUT ME

Judith A. Siess is a recognized expert in one-person librarianship and interpersonal networking. She was the editor and publisher of The One-Person Library: A Newsletter for Librarians and Management from 1998-2009 and is the author of articles for publications such as American Libraries and Searcher. An active member of SLA since 1980, she was the inaugural chair of its SOLO Librarian’s division, which is now the fourth largest division of the association with nearly 1,000 members. She has drawn from her more than twenty years’ experience to write seven books (see links). She is trying to retire, but it isn't working.